Scaffolding
by more-than-words
Summary: They're both crumbling - but they're still standing together. Elizabeth and Henry in the immediate aftermath of season 2.


Some angst and stuff... because they really needed to talk about the shit that went down in season 2. Thanks to Adi for the read-through and reassurance, and to Seamus Heaney for the title and some inspiration. Hope you enjoy and please let me know what you think! x

* * *

 _So if, my dear, there sometimes seem to be  
Old bridges breaking between you and me_

 _Never fear. We may let the scaffolds fall_  
 _Confident that we have built our wall._

from Scaffolding by Seamus Heaney

* * *

He brings the cold night air into the car with him when he eventually re-joins her. He sighs as he settles back against the seat, relaxing into the warmth of the car's interior while she shivers at the gust of frigid air when the door slams and at the press of his chilled clothing against her side.

Elizabeth isn't sure if she should say anything, doesn't want to do anything that might dislodge the look of quiet satisfaction that has taken up residence on Henry's face now he knows that Dmitri is safe - a little the worse for wear and no doubt with demons still to battle, but safe now in US custody, and travelling in the car behind them with specialist operatives who will take care of him going forward. She wants to ask Henry how he is, if he feels better now, but he has been on such a hair-trigger over the past few months she worries that he'll take it badly, read more into it than just a simple question.

So she stays quiet and simply inclines her head towards him but keeps her gaze lowered, letting him set the tone. After a minute, Henry lets out what sounds like a cathartic sigh and reaches out to take her hand. "OK," he says, like everything is fine, like the past few months never happened, "let's go home."

* * *

They go home.

They're supposed to be sleeping on the plane back to DC, but Elizabeth is unable to relax enough to close her eyes. She's too aware of Henry beside her and the way he is acting like a weight has been lifted, as though all of a sudden everything is good again, just like that. It makes her a little wary, like maybe it's a trick.

Damage like they have sustained doesn't just disappear.

"So have you thought about what you're going to do?" Henry asks her when the plane is somewhere over the Atlantic, his head lolling back against the seat as he turns to her and blinks drowsily.

The question draws her attention from the report she has been forcing herself to read in the hope it will either send her to sleep or at least be vaguely productive. "Hmm?"

He gives her a smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes and could almost have her believing that the whole Dmitri mess had never even happened, if not for where they are and the fact they left the kid under US guard on his way to the military hospital in Landstuhl just a few hours ago.

"Conrad's offer," Henry clarifies. "Have you thought about what you want to do?"

Elizabeth hesitates. She remembers the day that Conrad had asked her to be Secretary of State. As soon as he had left the house she had gone to seek out Henry and blurted out the whole thing, needing to tell him as soon as possible, needing to vent and wanting his counsel and his opinion on the mad situation she found herself in. This time is different. Because the answer to Henry's question is _yes_. She has thought about it. She knows what she wants to do, but she's worried that admitting to Henry that actually she wants to say yes to Conrad's offer to be on the ticket as his vice-presidential pick will be one thing too many for them to handle. She's worried that he won't agree.

She'll say no to the offer if she has to, but she hates the thought of this being the reason. She still occasionally feels lingering hurt over the Iraq station chief debacle. But she'd rather lose a job than her husband – she's just not sure where her husband stands anymore on the subject of _them_ , if actually she might somehow end up losing them both _._ She bites her lip and gives Henry a half-hearted shrug.

"Because I think you should do it," Henry says then, reaching out to brush her hair back over her shoulder and letting his fingers trail against the skin of her neck. "I think you'd be great at it. You'd be amazing."

Elizabeth is momentarily taken aback by Henry's response. Then she smiles back at him, tentatively because she is still hesitant to admit out loud that she wants this job, and she can feel a blush rising on her cheeks at his praise and the way he's looking at her – a way he hasn't looked at her very often in recent weeks. "Thanks," she says, quietly. Then something occurs to her. "But… what about you? Henry, the vice presidency is different to –"

"I know," he cuts her off, knowing what she's saying, knowing that she's telling him that his life would be different too if she were to be the vice president. "I know, babe. And I'm in. Man beside the woman, remember?"

She has a slightly bitter thought that yes, thanks, she does remember that, but it seems as though recently he has forgotten it. But that isn't productive, and this is neither the time nor the place to give space to the anger she feels about everything that has happened, the anger that she has only recently acknowledged exists alongside the pain and the worry of her husband pulling away from her. And she doesn't want to push him away now it seems that he is back. She nods. "I remember." Then she takes a moment to think about saying yes to Conrad. The blood rushes in her veins. "Oh, my God, Henry."

He chuckles and leans forward to rest his forehead against hers. "I know."

"I mean, I can't decide for sure until we talk to the kids, but…"

"But it's a yes," he fills in.

She nods, the skin of her forehead brushing against his, his breath warm against her face. "I think it's a yes."

It should be a happy decision, she thinks, such a happy thing and an honour, and it _is_ an honour, but there is still so much they have to solve first that for the rest of the plane ride home she struggles to feel anything other than overwhelmed.

* * *

The sense of being overwhelmed follows her all the way home, staying with her throughout the plane ride and the short walk to the car and then the car ride back to the house. She feels it inside her and surrounding her, her chest feeling ever so slightly constricted and her thoughts feeling like they're trapped, running around on a loop inside her head.

Elizabeth doesn't think Henry has noticed, thinks he has just put any slightly strange behaviour on her part down to the fact that she's exhausted from their recent dash across the ocean and strung out from the plane ride. She has become so used lately to him not realising – or not seeming to be bothered by – how she's feeling that she just assumes she has been able to keep the feeling of building stress to herself.

That illusion is shattered soon after they get back home. Having greeted Jason, the only one of the kids currently home, they head upstairs to their bedroom where Elizabeth kicks off her shoes before grabbing a clean set of pyjamas and heading towards the bathroom with the intention of changing and then curling up in bed to try to sleep in the hope that when she wakes up she'll feel better.

Henry's voice stops her. "Babe, what's the matter?"

So he has noticed.

He asks so casually, like it's an easy question, one that can be answered in a few short sentences and not the full soliloquy she knows it would take to properly elucidate what she's feeling. _Well, Henry, where do I start?_ The fact he can't talk to her because she reminds him of his failings, the fact he thinks everything is fine when it isn't – when she isn't – the fact that he could have died in Pakistan, the fact she thought she was losing him, the fact that she still might be?

She feels anger building towards him but forces herself to quash it as soon as it rises, because there's a part of her that worries if she gets properly angry with him, he'll take it to be confirmation of everything that's wrong and the problems he has with her and it will be the thing that breaks them. Then she's angry at herself for tempering her emotions around _Henry,_ the one person around whom she has always been able to be herself.

"I'm just tired," she says, and at least it isn't a lie.

Henry steps into her personal space and takes the pyjamas from her, tossing them down onto the bed to get her to focus on him. "Elizabeth," he prompts.

She feels tears building behind her eyes, but she doesn't want to cry. She doesn't want him to see her cry right now. And why the hell does he even need to ask her what's the matter? Is it not obvious from everything that's happened? They've been in couples' therapy, for Christ's sake. He has spent weeks acting like she's a stranger and now he has just decided everything is fine again, _she's_ fine again, and he wonders what it could be that's affecting her?

Maybe, she thinks, maybe he does get it, but he just wants her to spell it out for him to be sure they're talking about the same thing. But why does she have to spill first? She's not the one who has had the problem talking recently. Surely it's his turn.

"Baby, talk to me," Henry says when she stays quiet, catching her elbows in his hands and dipping his head to catch her gaze.

Or maybe he actually doesn't get it. She has never thought Henry to be an obtuse man; he has always been admirably in tune with his emotions as well as her own tell-tale cues – until now, it seems. He doesn't get the irony of telling her to talk when he has spent months doing anything but. Elizabeth wraps her arms protectively around herself, dislodging his grip. She thinks she might need the comfort if this goes badly. "I've tried," she tells Henry. "But every time I've tried to talk to you recently, you either shut me down or blow up in my face. I've tried, Henry!"

There's a long moment where silence stretches between them while he stares at her with an unreadable expression and she stares back, holding herself carefully in case something detonates. He doesn't look angry, which is good, although the fact that being angry with her is the first thing she expected him to be isn't good. Henry's eyes fall closed for a second and he looks like maybe he realises that, too. "I know," he says, eventually, looking back at her. "But not this time, OK? Not this time. I'm sorry." He takes a step towards her, hands out like he wants to touch her but doesn't want to spook her. "Talk to me, Elizabeth, please?"

A part of her – a big part – wants to give in, wants to do just that. Wants to talk to him and tell him what she's feeling, get it all off her chest because Henry has always been good at lessening her burdens and making her feel better. But right now she won't do that, can't do that. She can't be the only one to be vulnerable. Henry can't make this into a problem that she has while pretending that everything is fine with him, that he's back to normal just like that. So she won't tell him everything she's feeling, everything he has made her feel. Instead she just says, "I thought I was going to lose you."

He holds her close when they go to bed that night but she still feels the weight of the space that has opened up between them.

* * *

"I miss you," he says, two days later, and it's the thing that finally tips her over the edge.

They have been treading carefully around each other for the two days since they have arrived home from collecting Dmitri. Elizabeth has been caught up in the fallout of the spy swap and myriad other problems at the State Department, and so she hasn't been home that much. Henry, on the other hand, has been fulfilling his promise to be a couch potato and doesn't seem to have left the house at all since they got back from Finland.

She has been waiting for him to say something about all that has gone on, feeling her frustrations rise with each passing day when it seems that he's not about to talk about it, that he's perfectly fine with falling back into their routine without acknowledging the problem of how he has been feeling – and specifically how he has been feeling towards her.

But Elizabeth hasn't wanted to start a fight by bringing it up, so she has lived with the slight awkwardness, being careful in her responses to Henry and keeping herself slightly removed because she still can't bring herself to trust that things are OK now.

Then when she gets home on the second full day of being back, she's in the bedroom about to change out of her work clothes when he decides that it's an appropriate time to tell her out of the blue that he misses her, as though she has been away somewhere, as though she's the one who has spent months pulling back from their relationship, as though she doesn't actually have a very good reason to protect herself, as though, what? As though she's supposed to just melt into him at the admission?

It makes her snap and she slams shut the closet door, whirling around to face Henry in her pencil skirt and her untucked silk blouse, wishing that she hadn't kicked off her heels at the door because the height advantage would work well with her anger. "You _miss_ me?" she repeats, only louder and more incredulous than the tone he had used. "You miss me."

Henry stands a metre or so away from her, looking like he wasn't expecting the vehemence of her response. "Yes," he says.

Elizabeth chuffs out a disbelieving laugh. "Henry, I've been right here. I never went anywhere."

He looks like he's doing his best to keep his voice reasonable, like he's being careful not to rise to her anger, which suggests to her that he knows he is part of the problem but is still unwilling to outright admit it. "Babe, these last few days –"

"These last few days I've been terrified of doing something that will make you hate me again." If she has been distant it's only because she doesn't feel she can predict his reactions anymore. And if she mostly shouted that sentence at her husband then, well, hopefully it will help the words get through to him.

"Elizabeth, I never –"

She holds her hands up to stop him. "OK, maybe you never hated me, but you certainly didn't _like_ me for a while. And I can deal with you being angry, Henry. I can deal with us disagreeing on things, and I know that things aren't always going to be perfect. We're going to have rocky patches. But you've never… you've never bailed on me before." She has to fight to keep herself angry, because the alternative is to give in to the tears that are threatening behind her eyes, and as much as she has tried to avoid the anger, now it's here she's not ready to let it go. She thinks Henry needs to hear this. "But this time you did. You weren't there, Henry! I know it was hard, and I know some of it was my fault, but I tried so hard to make it work, to sort it out. I was hoping you'd meet me halfway, like you always do. Instead I just felt like I was losing you. And it _hurt_." Most of the volume drops from her voice then. "It still hurts."

For a minute, they just stand and stare at each other. Elizabeth is aware that she's breathing heavily, her shaky breaths sounding loud in the quiet of their bedroom. Henry is watching her softly, a hint of moisture in his eyes that suggests, maybe, it has finally hit him.

He swallows heavily and then takes a step forward, reaching out to her. "Elizabeth…"

She takes a step back on instinct, a response borne of lingering hurt, feeling her back connect with the door to the closet, the wood cool and solid behind her. Her eyes fall closed. "Please," she whispers.

"Please what?" Henry speaks quietly, but he has moved closer to her, close enough that his breath disturbs her hair and she can feel him standing just in front of her.

 _Please don't leave_ , she wants to say. Also _please understand_ and _please admit you have a problem_ and _please don't let me be vulnerable alone_.She goes with, "Please talk to me."

She thinks she can deal with almost anything he might say to her as long as he damn well says _something_.

Henry's lips press against her throat, brushing over her skin lightly before lingering in a kiss against her pulse. Then he moves up to the underside of her chin, nuzzling the soft skin before placing another kiss against her. "I'm here," he says, punctuating it with another kiss.

A small involuntary shiver ripples through her, but it's not what she wants. She doesn't want him to distract her with kisses, not just yet. Because that's not _talking_. Elizabeth opens her eyes and pushes at Henry's shoulders, making him lift his head and take a half-step back. "Are you really?" she asks, and it comes out just harsh enough that Henry looks slightly startled.

But it doesn't stop him from dipping his head to press a warm kiss to the corner of her mouth before he answers. "I'm sorry," he says, as he draws back. One hand rises to stroke her hair away from her face, fingers tangling in the strands. The look on his face is serious, and ever so slightly guilty.

 _Finally_.

"I'm sorry," he says again. "I never meant to make you doubt me." The hand not in her hair reaches out to wrap her fingers in his, squeezing gently. "Baby, I'm not going anywhere. I _love_ you."

Elizabeth looks down, blinking rapidly and still trying to quell the tears that seem so determined to fall. She's not ready for them yet. "I know you do," she answers. "But –"

This time, he cuts her off before she can tell him again her concern. "I was just so angry," he goes on. "And I felt so helpless, so powerless. And some of it was because of you, because of your decision about Dmitri."

 _Conrad's decision_ , she wants to say, but she bites her tongue. There's nothing to be gained by arguing that particular point right now.

Henry gives her a sad smile. "But I understand it. And if I hadn't been so personally invested it wouldn't have bothered me so much. Because that was the issue, really. I was just so _invested._ " He looks for the first time as though he's angry with himself rather than with her, like he's almost disgusted with himself for caring so deeply.

That isn't what she wants. Elizabeth may have wanted Henry to admit the part of the blame that lies with him, but she doesn't want him to feel badly for caring. "I love that you feel things so deeply," she says, flicking her gaze up to meet his briefly but mostly focusing on a spot on his chest, not yet quite ready to sink completely into him. "Really, Henry. I love that you care, I love that it means something to you. And I'm sorry, too, for my part in this. But –"

"There's professional and there's personal," he supplies.

"Right." It's a lesson she has had to learn herself – several times – over the years, at the CIA and in teaching and as Secretary of State. There comes a point where she has to draw a line between herself and the role she's carrying out. It's necessary for sanity and personal integrity as well as for professionalism. It's why her staff all call her _Madam Secretary_ in the office instead of _Elizabeth_.

It's a lesson that Henry has learned, too, in his various roles, but it's a long time since he has been in so deep and Dmitri obviously caught him unawares.

He's so good, her husband. So good and so moral… and also sometimes such a _guy_.

"I shouldn't have taken it out on you," Henry admits, looking sheepish. He leans forward to press a kiss to her temple. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry that I made you doubt me." He moves to hold her face in his hands, drawing her gaze up to meet his. "I promise you that I'm here, OK? I'm not going anywhere, ever. I love you."

"I love you, too," Elizabeth answers, allowing a small smile onto her lips for a moment.

It isn't fixed, not by a long shot. It isn't possible to deal with everything that is damaged in the space of one conversation, but she feels somewhat better now that Henry has admitted to the core of the problem.

"And hey," he says, his own smile crinkling at the corners of his eyes, "we never had our bowling and burgers date."

"We didn't."

"We should really rectify that."

The simple time together will help. Elizabeth nods and Henry leans in and kisses her, his lips moving soft and slow against hers, his tongue seeking entrance to her mouth and his body pressing gently against hers as she leans back against the closet door. Weirdly, it's his loving kiss that makes her suddenly break and she chokes a sob into him, unable anymore to hold in the tears that have been threatening for so long, unintentionally breaking the kiss as she feels herself start to shake and the tears start to fall.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." Henry gathers her up against him, arms strong and solid around her back as he directs her head to his chest and keeps her close.

She resists for a moment, still feeling the urge to hold herself separate, to protect herself from him because she isn't sure she can handle all that much more hurt, but then she hears the choke in Henry's breath and the hitch in his chest and feels the desperation as he holds her, almost clutching her to him, and she remembers that he's just as hurt as she is, albeit for slightly different reasons but his pain is no less legitimate. They're both crumbling – but they're still standing together.

So she stays, and holds onto him tightly, lets her tears soak his shirt and thinks about burgers and bowling and tomorrow. They still have tomorrow. "It's OK," Henry says, his voice sounding choked with tears of his own. "It'll be OK. We're OK, I promise."

For the first time in a long while, she thinks that she believes him.


End file.
